The present invention relates, in general, to a distillation device for purification of water, and more particularly to a compact, continuous flow distiller for supplying pure drinking water.
The global need for safe drinking water is commonly recognized. Increasing awareness of health problems resulting from chemicals, bacteria and viruses in drinking water is well documented. Point of use water purification by distillation is the best and only solution that addresses all water contamination problems.
Many water distillers have been developed to provide pure drinking water, however certain problems still exist in the art. Examples of some of these problems are: (1) some distillers are not economical since they have unnecessary maintenance cost and a low energy efficiency; (2) some produce too much heat radiating into the air, particularly in small offices and enclosed work area; (3) most water distillers are noisy because they have electric cooling fans that run at inconvenient times; (4) some water distillers have attempted to overcome the noise problem by using water cooled condensers; however, in the prior art this has created wastewater and required additional plumbing; and (5) some water distillers are difficult to maintain in good operating condition because of the difficulties encountered in cleaning sediment and scale from the interior of the distiller. In fact most water distillers require a substantial amount of disassembly involving multiple parts in order to fully clean the boiler. In many cases, the user will not realize the difficulty of this job until the water distiller fails to produce water up to its rated capacity.
Numerous attempts have been made to facilitate the de-scaling and cleaning of distillers, but such attempts have not completely solved the problems in the prior art. In most cases, such attempts have resulted only in additional plumbing and additional components, requiring additional maintenance and increasing the cost of the unit. Thus, the cost and maintenance of these prior art devices is an acknowledged disadvantage.
To avoid the need to disassemble a distiller, many attempts have been made to address the cleaning problem by the use of after market chemicals for removing scale in the boiler. However, this has not eliminated the difficult periodic required manual cleaning for proper maintenance of distiller components. Further, the use of chemicals for this purpose is expensive, a waste of natural resources and ultimately adds to the already-serious pollution problems.